


A Long Way

by lol-phan-af (lol_phan_af)



Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst with a Happy Ending, Getting Together, Growing Up, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-30
Updated: 2016-08-30
Packaged: 2018-08-11 22:55:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,171
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7910782
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lol_phan_af/pseuds/lol-phan-af
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John is four and his parents tell him that he's getting a sister.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Long Way

John is four and his parents tell him that he's getting a sister. He doesn't exactly understand where she's coming from or why his parents look so excited but they're smiling so he does it too because he wants to be happy for them.  
  
John is five and he's sitting in his mother's lap in the hospital as he holds his little sister. His small arms cradle her even smaller body as she stares up at him with big green eyes just like his. She's only just been born but dark curls are already forming on her head.  
  
Martha babbles something at him and John smiles, and when he doesn't say anything back she flails her chubby little arms underneath the blanket she's swaddled in and John wonders if she's trying to escape. He asks his mother, laughs when she does even though he doesn't understand what's funny.  
  
He's six and it's his first day of first grade when he meets a boy named Gregory. Gregory is missing two front teeth and most of the hair that should fall across his forehead is chopped off crudely. He has warm brown eyes and he offers his animal crackers to John across their desks because he doesn't like how they feel passing through the empty gaps in his teeth. John takes them, blushes when Gregory smiles at him.  
  
John is driven home in a fancy car that he recognizes by a quiet driver that he doesn't. He rushes into his house to tell his parents about Gregory but his father is still at work and his mother is too caught up with Martha to pay attention so he goes to their living room to watch tv and doesn't bring up Gregory.  
  
He's ten now and fifth grade is weird. They're still kids but people are starting to treat them like they are not and some of his classmates start believing them. His father tells him to stop watching the same tv shows that his sister and brother do, to go outside and make some friends. John huffs and agrees but watches the show with Martha because it's good and she needs someone to watch her while their mother was busy with baby Henry anyway.  
  
Gregory asks John what he thinks of a girl in their class one day, and John doesn't know how to answer.  
  
"Why, do you have a crush on her?" he asks for a reason that he can't decide on. Gregory chuckles, throws a Rubik's Cube up in the air above his face instead of solving it.  
  
"Maybe," he responds, winks. John feels it resonate through him, feel the blush rise up in his chest and shoulders and neck until his ears burn.  
  
"Yeah, she's nice, I guess," John mumbles, catches the cube before it falls back into Gregory's hand and starts to solve it.  
  
Gregory rolls his eyes, laughs and shoves him, calls him a name that ten year old boys probably shouldn't know.  
  
John is twelve and sixth grade is almost over. By now he realizes that he doesn't like girls the way most of the boys in his class do, the way his father tells him he should. He tries not to think about it, because it's not what his father wants of him and if he finds out then he'll be disappointed.  
  
Gregory rings his doorbell two days before school ends about fifty times and tackles John when he opens the door. John tells him to shut up, ushers him into his room so that Gregory can tell him whatever he has to.  
  
"She kissed me!" he yells, and once again John has to tell him to shut up because his parents are home and his baby brother James is asleep in the room next to his. Gregory nods and jumps up and down, slaps John's shoulder repeatedly because he can't contain his excitement.  
  
"Who kissed you?" John asks. His voice is straining and it hurts to ask but he does it anyway and pushes down the feeling of guilt rising up in his chest. Gregory squeals with his teeth bared, braces shining for John to look at.  
  
"I don't even remember her name! She's a seventh grader though, the really tall one that wears a push up bra," he explains. John doesn't know the girl he's talking about, he's not even sure Gregory knows the girl he's talking about, but John pictures her in his head.  
  
Tall. Gregory said she was tall so she has to be tall. Her lips are probably soft, not like his, chapped and picked at until his lip splits and he bleeds and his mother scolds him and buys him chap stick that his father says he shouldn't use because it's for girls. Her nails would probably be painted, and she'd wear lip gloss because John is terrified of lip gloss and he's terrified of this girl.  
  
The girl that got to kiss Gregory wouldn't be nice, John decides. He holds on to that to combat the perfect image of this girl that he's created in his head. She'd be awful, would probably make fun of Gregory for being stupid enough to be happy about this. She'd whisper about it to her friends, she's probably doing it right now.  
  
John thinks he's starting to believe that his childhood is ending. Gregory and him barely hang out that summer because the girl that he kissed has cool parents that let boys go to their daughter's house. This is what happens when you grow up, you grow apart, forced to face the world alone because your best friend has a girlfriend despite you only being twelve.  
  
Seventh grade is disgusting.  
  
Even more people expect even more success from them even though they're still only twelve and don't know most things about the world yet. John is his father's pride and joy, if only he knew what John was keeping from him.  
  
Gregory and his girlfriend break up two weeks into the school year, and John was surprised to find out that he didn't really care that much. He shrugs, tells John he was only in it for what he could get out of it and John yells at him because that's awful and they're twelve and what the fuck is he thinking. Gregory apologizes, pushes his hair off of his face and John almost forgets to be angry because of how much he wants to kiss him.  
  
John walks through his hallway, thinking about what he wants to do for his thirteenth birthday party when he hears his father say his name from his office. John steps to the door, thinking that maybe this has something to do with his party, and presses his ear to the door.  
  
"No, John doesn't have a girlfriend yet. I'm sure he'll get one soon, no woman ever being able to resist a Laurens man."  
  
John almost laughs at how stupid his father sounds before it registers.  
  
His blood runs cold. He trips as he backs away from the door, stumbles to his room and locks himself in, collapses on the floor and heaves until he's hacking. 

  
When he's sixteen, his mother dies giving birth to his youngest sister Mary Eleanor.  
  
John's father refuses to even look at her, won't do anything that resembles raising her in any way, so John has to do it himself. He takes care of her because Henry will not, practically raises her for the first ten months of her life.  
  
He's still sixteen when Henry announces to them that he's moving their whole family to England to live. John tries to protest, steps up to parent his siblings because someone has to. He hands Mary to Martha and tells all of them to go to her room and not come out, and then he screams at his father until he can't anymore.  
  
He mentions his brothers and sisters first, because it's mainly about them. He talks about himself, because no matter how much his father wants him to be he is not going to yield to him, not this time. He doesn't say everything, is holding it back because he'd rather not mention it, because the wound is still fresh and he can't pick at it.  
  
John finishes ranting because he can no longer speak and Henry stares at him like he's deciding on what weapon he should use to murder him with.  
  
"We are going to London, and that's final."  
  
"You can't do this."  
  
"I can do what ever I want, John. I am your father and you will listen to me until you no longer live under my roof."  
  
"You're a coward," he spits, "running away because you can't handle it. Because you can't handle the fact that mom died and you're trying to take us away with y-"  
  
His father smacks him, and he falls to the ground from the impact. It's not the first time he's done this, far from it, but it's the first time John fought. It's the first time he did something about it. He scrambles to get up, goes to Martha's room because they need him right now.  
  
They leave two weeks after that, and John has his very first kiss the night before the go when Gregory doesn't have anything else to give John to remember him by.  
  
When John is eighteen he's in Switzerland to continue his studies and he meets a very attractive boy named Francis. John becomes friends with him and kisses him while he is explaining a subject that John has no interest in and is delighted when Francis kisses him back.  
  
His father finds out about Francis two months after they kiss for the first time. John doesn't know how, doesn't want to know the exact extent of his father's knowledge of his relationship with him.  
  
John leaves Francis to go back to London one week later, being forced to study law by his father even though he'd rather do anything else. He promises Francis that he'll call as Francis tries to pull him back into his house. John leans into it for what seems like one second but by the time he leaves half of the buttons on his shirt are undone.  
  
John is forced to stay in London for two years after his father leaves and takes all of John's siblings with him. It's bittersweet, John's concern for his siblings being alone with their father occasionally being sidelined by the string of relationships he forms and ends in that time.  
  
He's twenty-two when a girl named Martha kisses him against a wall in a bar. Her lip gloss feels like slime and tastes like artificial watermelon and it makes John want to throw up. He pushes her off of him and vomits on her expensive looking high heels. She screams and he apologizes, runs away and gets lost for two hours because he's so lightheaded he can't see straight.  
  
John moves back to America when he's twenty-three. Gregory still lives in his neighborhood, and they meet up a few times and John starts falling in love with him again.  
  
John is twenty-three and his father catches him making out with Gregory on his bed and for a moment John feels much younger than he actually is.  
  
He leaves South Carolina by force the next day and Gregory doesn't try to follow him.  
  
John moves to New York and spends two months feeling like the tiniest being on earth. Skyscrapers surround him and they feel like steep cliffs and he's drowning in shallow water. He spends most of his time curled up on the floor in his apartment because he can't convince himself to do anything else besides eat.  
  
He's going out for food again for the third time that week when gets lightheaded. He leans against the wall and everything goes dark and then someone is asking him if he's okay but he's out before he can answer.  
  
He wakes up to two people whispering above him. He's on a couch that's not his because he does not own a couch but it's softer than the floor he sleeps on and he doesn't want to get up.  
  
"He's awake," one of them says. John opens his eyes and sees a very short man talking to a very tall man and John thinks he's died and gone to heaven because this is what angels look like and John knows it.  
  
"Am I dead?" John asks, needs the confirmation just so he can enjoy it. The shorter man laughs and the taller one nods slowly and winks at him.  
  
"No, sorry. I'm Alexander Hamilton, this is Hercules Mulligan. I saw you pass out on the street so I brought you here."  
  
"Thank you."  
  
John learns almost immediately after he's healed that Alexander talks fast. John adapts to it, learns to respond just as quickly. Hercules watches them talk sometimes, says that he can't keep up with it but it doesn't matter because they're both so pretty all he wants to do is stare. John will roll his eyes but blush and Hercules will wiggle his eyebrows before he changes the subject.  
  
John moves into their apartment when he's twenty-four. Alexander had kissed him on both cheeks when he agreed to it and John wished he would do it again.  
  
John loves Alexander, but he's too scared to admit it. Alexander seems too bright, like those skyscrapers when he first came here. Alexander doesn't say anything to John either, so John doubts himself until he almost wants to move out of their apartment despite just moving in.  
  
When John is twenty-five, he comes home from work to Alex darting around their kitchen frantically while multiple things cook on the stove. Alex tells him that someone is coming over for dinner and John just agrees and helps him because Alex looks worried and John wants to help him not be.  
  
It's not that John hates John André, because he doesn't. He's pretty and funny and everything you could ever want in a significant other, but watching him shamelessly flirt with Alexander while eating the spaghetti that they made makes him a little less appealing.  
  
André leaves later that night and Alexander doesn't stop smiling until he goes to bed that night. John watches him walk to his room, doesn't realize he's crying until Hercules is wiping the tears from his face with his thumb.  
  
"I thought it was just me," Hercules whispers. John knows what he means, falls into his arms without warning, tries his hardest not to cry loud enough for Alexander to hear and he thinks it works because Alexander never comes out to check on him.  
  
Hercules kisses John against their kitchen counter one night after they were both woken up by what André and Alexander never seem to stop doing in his room.  
  
"Fuck, I'm sorry. I don't know what that was, I'm really sorry," Hercules whispers but before he can continue to apologize John kisses him again.  
  
One week before John's twenty-sixth birthday, Alex comes home and collapses into John's lap.  
  
"You okay?" John asks, smiling down at him.  
  
"No, I'm annoyed."  
  
"Why?"  
  
"Me and André broke up," he explains, shrugging. John runs his hands through his Alex's hair, doesn't ask what happened, knows Alex will tell them if he only stays silent.  
  
"He fucking cheated on me, John." John's hands stop.  
  
Alexander doesn't cry about it, just throws away all of the stuff André ever gave him and moves on with his life. John doesn't know how he does it, but Alexander always finds ways to amaze him.  
  
On John's twenty-sixth birthday, after they'd gone out to dinner and Alex had gone to bed, John is lying naked in Hercules' bed when he mumbles something into his stomach that John can't make out.  
  
"What?" John asks. Hercules presses his forehead to his stomach and sighs, which makes John shiver but it's not exactly important right now.  
  
"Do you think we should stop this?" Hercules asks, gesturing.  
  
"No, why?"  
  
"I mean, Alex is single now, and I love you but you love Alex and I jus-"  
  
"Hercules."  
  
"What?"  
  
John reaches to hold Hercules' face in both of his hands and pull him up to kiss him. He does it over and over again until Hercules understands that he's not going anywhere.  
  
"I love you too," he whispers.  
  
That's all Hercules needs to hear.  
  
Alexander meets Elizabeth Schuyler, and he has it bad. He goes on a date with her and comes home drunk on it, laughs about how that feels, drapes himself across Hercules and John's laps and giggles about how he's going to marry her. John and Hercules indulge him, speak their support but don't mean it.  
  
On New Year's, John and Hercules meet Lafayette. They're beautiful with slim fingers that they use to grip John's hips when they dance while Hercules goes to get them drinks.  
At that same party, Alex gets drunk and sleeps with a girl named Maria, and Eliza never speaks to him again.   
  
Alexander spent a month trying to get her back, but all it got him was a black eye from her sister and pepper sprayed in the eyes by her sibling.  
  
John breaks into Alexander's room right before he's about to go out with Lafayette and Hercules for Valentine's Day and finds him asleep with a pen in one hand and a notebook in the other.  
  
John takes the book from him, eyes catching on what's written there.  
  
It's an apology to Eliza, written over and over and over again in different colors and sizes and languages. It overlaps to the point of incoherence, but John can pick out certain pieces of it where has hasn't written over as much.  
  
He flips to another random page, almost drops it when he sees what it is.  
  
It's confessions. Love confessions. Love confessions to John and Hercules and angry letters to André and offhanded notes about how attractive Lafayette is even though he was still in love with Elizabeth. He finds statements of jealousy towards what Hercules and John have and how he wants that and how he just wants someone he can't hurt.  
  
"John!" Lafayette calls and John is so shocked by it that he drops the book and watches as it clatters to the ground. The sound wakes Alex up, and John runs out of the room before Alex sees what he did.  
  
Four months pass until Alex is over Eliza, and John has never been so frustrated in his life. He loves Lafayette and Hercules more than life itself, but the fact that Alex knows that John loves him back terrifies him.  
  
It's John's twenty-seventh birthday and he comes home to someone much shorter than him grabbing him by the lapels of his jacket and slamming their lips together. John swears that he can feel his own teeth rearrange, but he doesn't care now.  
  
John is twenty-seven years old.  
  
He's come a long way. 

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know what this is only that it took me five hours to write


End file.
